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The Untold Story Of The Alleged Mass Rapes By The Indian Army In Kunan Poshpora

The battle starts with a firm determination but with the flow of time we find ourselves in a web, a vicious circle where one won’t be given a choice to win but only to withdraw and where the days and years will pass until we become immune to our pain. The haunting memories are still there but hope falters. That’s the story of hundreds of innocent people of Kashmir, who are victims of atrocities done by the Indian army. These innocent people still have the faith and strength to look up to justice from the judiciary or government who have themselves given the ‘license to offence’ to the military via Armed Forces Special Powers Act / Public Safety Act and where the truth has been suffocated under the heavy sheet of hypocrisy prevalent in our system. One of the most heinous crimes perhaps for me is the Kunan-Poshpora rape case where women numbering anywhere between 53 to 100 were raped by the very men who had been appointed by the central government to protect them.

On the night of 23/24 February 1991, Army personnel of 4 Rajputana Rifles entered Kunan Poshpora village with the mission to cordon off and to find grenades. Instead, they caught all the men of the village, interrogated them and severely tortured them physically and emotionally to the extent of barbarism while the women of the village were raped irrespective of their age, at gun point. One of them had even delivered a child a few days ago. All were raped in front of their small children who looked on crying in horror while their mother was raped by beasts. On March 19th, a UK based newspaper ‘The Independent’ carried a report titled, ‘Indian villages tell of mass rape by soldiers’, based on narratives the reporters had heard in Kunan Poshpora. Among them was the story of a woman who was assaulted by six soldiers. “One by one, they raped me, while my five year old son was forced to watch, weeping beside the bed,” she told the paper. Almost all the women of the village were raped. The next morning when the men were released, they were shocked to see that their daughters, mothers, sisters and female acquaintances had been raped by the men in uniform. The whole village froze on that morning of 24th February, not because it was cold but due to the nature of the heinous crime which infected villagers with dead silence yet loud mourning. They wandered like madmen, crying on top of their voice still shaken up by the jolt to think of anything about their next step. How are people supposed to react when they are stripped off their dignity, that they have nurtured for years leaving them haunted with their own bleeding flesh?

Why has the army enjoyed so much of impunity? What is it that has really failed our system and the state to charge the army and reprimand it into the court if we are to be considered for one moment a ‘secular-democratic nation’ where the government is ‘of the people, by the people and for the people’

Where is the media now? Why have they failed to cover the incident in the same manner on grounds of humanity and as per the ethos and grounds on which the media should function? Why have the people, especially those residing outside the state of Jammu and Kashmir and working on human rights, have consistently failed to bring into light this rape incident? Why has there been a total black out created over the Indian state and its masses about such mass brutality and torture? Why has the government chosen to remain ignorant about the human rights violations that are taking place in Kashmir? Perhaps the truth is too costly to be told. Perhaps power is mighty and justice blind.

The growing pockets of solidarity expressed for Kashmiris are heartening, as is the solidarity for Palestinian struggle.

The India and Israel alliance has been described as a full-blown romance, but the ongoing siege of Kashmir makes this a bloody affair - covert for years.

India has bought arms from Israel since the 1960s. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is to visit Israel in 2017, marking the 25th anniversary of full diplomatic relations.

The two nations are passionate about their brutal occupations of Kashmir and Palestine. India is one of Israel's biggest arms exports clients, spending about $10bn over the past decade. Indian police forces have been receiving training in Israel for "anti-terror" operations, which Israeli conducts against Palestinians.

This terror frame supports the economy of arms trade between India, Israel and the United States. In this story, the aggressive religious nationalisms of Zionism and Hindutva are neutral shared security interests. Kashmiri and Palestinian quests for self-determination are reduced to neighbouring Muslim or Arab states causing unrest.

We live in a time when nation-states overtly commit war crimes, are cheered on by bloodthirsty majoritarian citizens, and literally get away with murder.

There are about 500,000 military personnel in the region - in other words, one soldier for 25 civilians. The Jammu and Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society reports more than 70,000 killings, about 10,000 enforced disappearances and 7,000 mass graves (PDF).

Torture, rape, sexual violence, enforced disappearances, and extra-judicial killings are widespread. These human rights violations are intricately linked to the denial of political sovereignty for Kashmiris.

We desperately need to reconsider our West versus non-West understanding of the geography of colonialisms. The years 1947 and 1948 mark the creation of the nation-states of India and Israel. These years scar Kashmiris and Palestinians.

Palestinians have been dispossessed of territory and many forced into exile. Kashmir was handed over from an unpopular ruler without the legitimacy of popular vote to the Indian state on October 26, 1947.

A condition of that accession is the United Nations resolution of 1948 for referendum or plebiscite, never facilitated by the Indian state. Israel and India thus inaugurate the colonial occupations of Palestine and Kashmir.

When is an occupation not an occupation? When it is executed by one of the world's largest markets? When is a butcher not a butcher? When he is a prime minister; or when he is an ally?

Let's not forget that Modi was denied a visa to the US in 2005 for his alleged responsibility over the mass murder of Muslims during the Gujarat riots. His nickname, the "Butcher of Gujarat", comes from that 2002 event. He can now add the title of the "Butcher of Kashmir" to his name - even as that title fits previous Indian prime ministers.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, like his predecessors, can be named the "Butcher of Palestinians" as he presided over the brutal bombing of Gaza in 2014 that killed 2,100 Palestinians, a third of them children.

The US was the sole vote against the UN inquiry, and European countries abstained, as did India. The Gaza bombing was not the first and it is not the last as the violence of occupation continues in Palestine daily in the form of illegal settlements and killings.

The word democracy glitters like fool's gold on the tongues of world leaders. Human rights regimes seem toothless in the face of the bold barbarisms of nation-states invested in repressing democracy, and need reform if they are to deliver justice.

The small but growing pockets of solidarity expressed for Kashmiris are heartening, as is the international solidarity for Palestinian struggle.

Joining the dots between the occupations of Kashmir and Palestine shows the need for a greater solidarity between these two sovereignty struggles.

India swiftly rejects U.N. request for a visit to the disputed territory of Kashmir

India on Tuesday rejected a request by the United Nations’ human rights chief for a visit to gather information on the disputed territory of Kashmir, where security forces have been accused of using excessive violence in trying to quell unrest.

Zeid Raad Hussein, the U.N. high commissioner for human rights, called for “access that is unconditional to both sides of the Line of Control,” the boundary between India and Pakistan that runs through Kashmir.

Speaking to the U.N. Human Rights Council in Geneva, Hussein said his request was granted by Pakistan, which accuses Indian forces of human rights violations in the Himalayan territory that the countries have skirmished over for seven decades.

“I believe an independent, impartial and international mission is now needed crucially and that it should be given free and complete access to establish an objective assessment of the claims made by the two sides,” Hussein said.

New Delhi swiftly responded that an external inquiry was unnecessary and that it was “fully engaged in normalizing the situation as soon as possible.”

At least 81 people – nearly all civilians – have died in the Indian-controlled portion of Kashmir since July 9, when protests erupted after Indian security forces killed Burhan Wani, a 22-year-old separatist.

In the main government hospital in Srinagar, the summer capital of Indian-administered Kashmir, more than 800 people have been treated for eye injuries caused by the pellets, which are made of metal and encased in a thin rubber coating. Many of them have lost at least partial eyesight.

Under a controversial security law, Indian authorities enjoy broad powers to crack down on unrest in Kashmir. Human rights groups have assailed tactics used by security forces, accusing paramilitary police of firing pellets that have injured or blinded peaceful demonstrators and even children sitting in their homes.

Appeal by the Concerned Citizens Collective for support for a Humanitarian Intervention in Jammu and Kashmir in response to plight of civilians, in particular children, facing a serious medical crisis.

We are aware that during past five months, in the stone pelting by agitators and counter fire by security forces in Kashmir, many children have suffered serious injuries from pellets and shelling in Kashmir. A large number of minors are suffering extensive injuries, including disfigurement, eye injuries and some blinded for life. Children and their families are suffering from psycho-social trauma in a context where the very limited psychiatric facilities are already strained.

According to the report of an all India fact finding team consisting twenty-five citizens representing people's movements, women’s organisations, trade unions, human rights groups, journalists, writers and filmmakers, who visited Kashmir from 11 to 20 November 2016,

"In the last 135 days, over 102 unarmed civilians have been killed; more than 15,000 people have been injured in pellet firing and shelling, of which around 7,000 are cases of severe injury. A majority of those who have been injured are young and many are minors."

Local groups and organisations are already engaged in health care work and have conducted medical camps at Tral, Shopian, Anantnag, Kulgam, Pulwama, Old-town Baramulla, Sopore, and Palhalan. According to their assessment, the entire medical infrastructure of J & K is under severe stress in coping with both the extensive injuries, disfigurements, and blindings, as well as other medical needs such cardiac, pulmonary, and pediatric complications.

This is an urgent appeal for experts in ophthalmology, cardiology, pulmonology, endocrinology, pediatrics, orthopedics, and psychiatry to offer their services for as much time as they can to supplement the meagre facilities available in J&K.

Efforts are being made to diagnose gaps and remedies for the ophthalmological infrastructure of the state. Also to be determined is the appropriate design for a community based psycho-social care intervention. A humanitarian delegation will be visiting the Kashmir valley in early December to map the human cost borne particularly by children, youth and women, and to develop the scope of an appropriate medically oriented humanitarian response.

Dr Srinivas Murthy, an experienced conflict counselor formerly associated with WHO, has kindly agreed to help with this initiative. Dr. Mathew Verghese, formerly Director of St Stephen’s Hospital Delhi and Dr. Shobna Sonpar, a clinical psychologist with experience in conflict related trauma, have indicated their support for this effort. We have also received encouraging response from doctors from different states including senior doctors in government service who have indicated their willingness to participate in this initiative in their personal capacity.

We appeal to you to contribute in cash and kind as well as volunteer for providing the urgently needed medical, mental health and social support to the beleaguered people in Kashmir.